The practice of hand-loading or reloading is the process of loading firearm ammunition cartridges or shotgun shells by assembling the individual components (case/hull, primer, powder, and bullet/shot), rather than purchasing completely assembled, factory-loaded ammunition. Many gun owners load their own ammunition instead of buying manufactured ammunition for a variety of reasons such as cost savings and consistent performance and reliability. As the term reloading suggests, a cartridge case can be reused more than one time, and often times it can be reused many times depending on how powerful a load is used. A piece of ammunition consists of a case, a primer which is an explosive device that fits into the back of the cartridge case, powder inserted into a cartridge case and a bullet inserted into the front of the cartridge case. After a unit of ammunition is fired, reloaders will save their cartridge cases (aka “brass” because cartridge cases are generally made of brass) to reload again.
The explosion of gunpowder inside of the cartridge case leaves a dirty and fouled residue and must be cleaned out before reloading again. Machines called ultrasonic case cleaners are used to perform this cleaning function. These ultrasonic case cleaners use water and specially formulated solutions to aid in the cleaning of the cartridge cases. After the cartridge cases are clean, there is residual water and cleaning agent left in the case. The cartridge case must be absolutely dry before introducing a gun powder or propellant into the cartridge case and the inability to have a dry cartridge case will lead to faulty and unpredictable loaded ammunition. Because of the encapsulated nature of the cartridge cases, it can take an undesirable length of time to dry the case out. There exists a case dryer in the prior art that has been modelled after a food dehydrator but it is highly inefficient and takes an extended time to fully dry the cases. One particular reason this case dryer is not efficient is that it does not allow for vertical placement and drainage of water out of the case. A further reason why the prior art dryer is ineffective is that it does not allow a sufficient amount of air to be directly introduced inside the case. What is needed in the art is a cartridge case dryer that allows for rapid drying of the case.